[TriLUG] Virtual Box ?

[Alan Porter]

If I understand your question... you're asking:

    Can you take a snapshot of a machine running WinXP natively, and use
    that image as a guest under VirtualBox?


Yes, you can do it.

Will it be easy?  No.

The problem is that Windows XP is very picky about the hardware it was 
installed on.  We're used to Linux, which is very flexible at boot time, 
deciding on the fly which drivers to load.  Windows XP, on the other 
hand, depends on install-time decisions about what drivers to load.  So 
if you change the hardware out from under it (like when you boot a 
laptop image under a VirtualBox virtualized hardware environment), it 
will freak out when it notices all of the hardware is different.  A lot 
of those problems result in very hard-to-diagnose blue screen errors or 
bootup error codes.

But it can be done.  I have done it.  A lot of it depends on whether you 
get lucky with your original native installation being similar in 
hardware to the virtual hardware that VirtualBox presents to the 
machine.  Plus, there are things you can set from the menus or config files.

I just recently did the same thing for a Windows 7 installation, 
migrating a native installation to KVM.  Fortunately, I was migrating to 
the same physical machine... that is, the KVM host was the same hardware 
that was originally running Windows 7.

To make the snapshot, I simply used "dd" to copy the entire disk. Then I 
upgraded the disk, installed Linux, installed KVM, created an 
"original-HD-sized" LVM volume, dd-ed the disk image back, crossed my 
fingers and rebooted it.  I had to run the MS disk repair tool a few 
times, and chkdsk and some other MS voodoo.  But eventually it did boot up.

It's almost like doing that 
"pull-the-tablecloth-out-from-under-the-dishes" trick... except in reverse!

Good luck... you may need it.

Alan



On 11/06/2012 03:32 PM, Michael Rulison wrote:
> If:
>     VB is installed under Ubunto and
>     Win XP is created and results in a working "machine" and snapshot 
> (an image? of the state of the system) and
>     from WinXP, separately, say on another laptop, one can create a 
> snapshot/image of THAT system....
>
> Then
> is it possible to move that snapshot into/under VB on the first 
> machine and have access to a windows guest w/o having to install the 
> Win OS, other software, etc.?
>


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